Per­son hurt, con­fused af­ter dat­ing co-worker

QUES­TION: On my first date with a co-worker, he said that he loved me, which I felt was too fast, too soon.

That month, he said that he wanted to have a baby with me. When I said things are mov­ing too fast, he thought that I wasn’t in­ter­ested in the re­la­tion­ship.

He’d con­stantly text me at work. He bought me a $78 box of makeup and said I look good in makeup, though pre­vi­ously he’d said he liked me with­out it.

He then wanted to marry me on my birth­day. I said again that it’s mov­ing way too fast for me.

I even­tu­ally had to com­plain about him at work be­cause I of­ten felt pres­sured and stressed out. He said that it’s ei­ther mu­tual love or mu­tual leave.

I’m hav­ing a hard time deal­ing with hurt and con­fu­sion, and see­ing him at work. I was be­gin­ning to feel that he did love me. How can I deal with this re­la­tion­ship hav­ing gone bad and for­get about him? I feel guilty for telling on him.

AN­SWER: You’ve been bom­barded by a ma­nip­u­la­tive con­troller. You’re well rid of him for your men­tal health.

Feel no guilt. Feel re­lief in­stead, be­cause a longterm re­la­tion­ship with him would have you far more stressed out, al­ways try­ing to sat­isfy his lat­est wish. Ev­ery­thing he did and said was de­signed to have you jump­ing to his lat­est com­mand: Love im­me­di­ately, wear no makeup, then start us­ing makeup, marry when I de­cide, etc., etc.

No won­der you reached out for help with your com­plaint. That was your in­stinct to save your­self from fur­ther ha­rass­ment.

Ma­nip­u­la­tive peo­ple draw you into their plans for them­selves, by try­ing to con­trol you. He loved him­self more than he loved you.